One of the fun things about redoing some of the pages I started long ago for this story is that I can sprinkle in some Lord of the Rings/Mordor imagery. Watching too much Game of Thrones led to the little heads on pikes around the evil castle. You may be barely able to see them, but they are there…

This has been a looooong time coming. In fairy tale jargon one could say, “Once upon a time…”

Since 2003, I have dipped my toes in comics by contributing to Slam Bang The Comic Anthology for my friend Allen Freeman. As I was just starting to illustrate children’s books, I became interested in illustrating a fairy tale story.

Allen suggested Chris and almost immediately he cracked out this comic script. Unfortunately, when I got this in 2005ish, I also got caught in a wave of book deadlines that lasted years. I was able to do 4 pages of the 10 page story and then it came to a halt. Occasionally, Chris would write a nice email asking if I was ever going to finish… In intervening years, Allen had themes for each issue that this story never seemed to fit into or I was completely slammed.

When I started Pop Smoothie, I decided to make this my own personal Mad Magazine. In recent issues of Slam Bang, I had done mashups and humorous comics I enjoyed so much, that it seemed like a perfect way to start my web comic.

The Fairy Godfather completely fit the creative brief so perfectly, it was as if Chris was psychic. The only snag was the art I did in 2006 did not seem to fit with how my comic work has developed.

Redrawing these pages really has made me appreciate how funny the writing is. I love this first installment.

(After this series is finished, I will show the original 4 pages, maybe…)